How exactly does this work, apart from applications built with Cordova or its predecessor PhoneGap? Android applications are written in the Java programming language or an NDK language or both, not JavaScript, which is what Chrome apps use [chrome.com]. So how are Android apps ported to Chrome?

Na - I got mine from BestBuy. I walked in and asked for one - had to order it and wait for two days. The store guys said they can't keep the store inventory up with the demand, but they keep getting them in the distribution warehouses.

Not to mention in every town there is one or more shops that are happy to sell you Windows 7, be it on desktops or laptops, and of course for the past...ohh I'd say at least the last 5 years or so, computers have frankly been so insanely overpowered compared to what the customers actually do with the thing there simply isn't a real reason to upgrade before they die which can be quite awhile. Hell most of my customers simply had me install Win 7 on the systems they had bought from me with XP, why? Because they were duals,triples, and quads and so overpowered that they do everything they want them to so why buy another before that one dies?

But for any of those that think "Win 8 is just the 'Star Trek Rule' in action" nope, take a gooood look as Ballmer has made it clear in his "Windows Blue" memo that this is it, you can have Apple or overpriced MSFT hardware pretending to be Apple, they are gonna copy everything down to the stores and making their own hardware and trying to lock everything down into a black box appstore centric model, so Win 7 is pretty much the last real copy of Windows if Ballmer doesn't get fired.

Frankly I don't see how the OEMs have any choice, MSFT is already fucking the living hell out of them when it comes to Windows licenses (now rumored to be over $50 a copy for Windows Home, with NO breaks on price no matter how many they buy) and is gonna be trying to actively destroy them with their own MSFT branded hardware in 2013. So they really don't have a choice here, either they close their doors or they find a new supplier and I have a feeling Google will be happy to take that business. I predict if the board doesn't quit smoking crack and fire the Ballmernator that in less than 3 years you'll see all the OEMs pushing ChromeTops and ChromeBooks and they'll have a few VERY expensive Windows machines in the corner that they won't advertise and won't give a shit about because it would be like Kmart pushing Walmart brands, all you are doing is helping the company that wants to put you out of business.

So while the ChromeBooks are limted to online now I have a feeling by summer of this year you are gonna see a TON of new models, in all different sizes and prices, all over the retailers and the online. I mean what else can they do? Its that or do like Nvidia did with chipsets and just close the doors, MSFT has made it clear the "future" of Windows is MSFT OSes running on MSFT hardware sold from a MSFT store with a very high MSFT markup, no way they are gonna sell Windows licenses cheap enough for the OEMs to keep selling against them.

To me the sad part will be the death of DIY and the little shops, because as we have seen with the latest Chromebooks they are getting more and more locked down (hell you can't even run Linux on the things without 3 pages worth of CLI and a LOT of finger crossing) so what you will end up with is disposable black boxes, more like cellphones than today's desktops and laptops.

And sorry about the length but this really fucking depresses me, not because of the shop as I've been moving more into home theaters and security setups anyway, but because it looks like we are going back to the 80s with everything locked down and proprietary, its all gonna be soldered chips that boot from locked BIOS into a locked OS that requires everything go through an appstore owned by the company that owns the OS, but people standing in line to buy overpriced iToys have convinced the IT world that that is what people want,locked down appliances instead of general purpose computing. Fucking shame and I have a feeling the next decade or two is gonna really suck balls and computers will pile up in the landfills like old gaming consoles because you won't be able to do jack shit with them when the corps stop supporting it, but that is what the consumer seems to want.

You get a gaming PC (hardware only) for £600, but Windows 7/8/whatever costs an extra £200. Same in Norway, Get a gaming PC for 6000 Kronar, but Windows whatever costs another 2000 Kronar, which amounts to the cost of another GPU card, external backup drive, some extra memory or simply 2/3 weeks food shopping.

What is the major difference between Windows 7/8 and XP or a Linux distro? Just the GUI

What is the major difference between Windows 7/8 and XP or a Linux distro? Just the GUI

I truly wish that was the major difference. If that was all that was different I would have switched our company away from Windows years ago and so would many others. The major difference is the applications and that is the only difference that truly matters. If everything was written cross-platform, then you would have a credible argument.

For better or worse there are a LOT of applications (including games) that only run on Windows and it remains sadly true that there often are no acceptable replacements. Our accounting software, MRP software, CAD software and some others simply are not available on linux, nor is there any acceptable substitute. We use LibreOffice, GIMP, Scribus, Inkscape, Chrome, Thunderbird, VNC, and more but there simply is no way we could get rid of our Windows boxes in the near future because of the applications we need to use. The moment there is a linux version of Quickbooks Enterprise and a compatible MRP system, I'd dump windows that minute but that simply isn't going to happen in the foreseeable future.

There's a tiny little outfit called Autodesk that publishes this minor little package called AutoCAD. *I've* never been able to find a Linux version of it -- in fact, even their license manager (which is built on FlexLM, a predominantly Unix server product) is Windows only.

If you could point me to a Linux version of AutoCAD, I'd be forever grateful. But I'm not holding my breath.

I've heard that Solidworks is the up and coming CAD package, eclipsing AutoCAD. Also Windows only.

You sir should be upmodded to a thousand, because this is something I've been trying to get the Linux advocates to understand for years...you HAVE to have Quickbooks, the SMBs live or die by Quickbooks and frankly the few ersatz FOSS programs out there trying to fit that niche are as bad a replacement as Gimp is a suitable replacement for Photoshop for graphics professionals.

I don't know how many SMBs I have that have their entire company, from inventory to accounting to taxes, run by a "Quickbooks girl"

"Kronar" is a common misspelling when writing Nynorsk (new Norwegian).The monetary unit is called kroner in both Norwegian languages; but the coins are (sometimes) called {value}kronar in new Norwegian (tikronar - has a value of 10 kroner).

I'm surprised I'm mostly agreeing with you but you are wrong on one count, chromebooks are not locked down to the people who want to get out of the garden.

Chromebooks have a developer mode which allows you to dualboot linux and chrome os.For mum and dad a walled garden of a mostly self administrating system is very appealing log into your gmail account enter the password for the router (its written on a label on the back of the router) and thats it setup.compare that user experience with the one that you go through with windows all the trialware, hardsell and the rest its scary.

I bet you are asked everyday if you will setup a new windows machine for someone mostly because of that preinstalled junk.

What Google has wisely chosen to do is allow for an alternative Linux install for those people who want a bit more than the chromebook offers. For years people have been ripping out windows or moving to dualboot systems so they can scratch their itch.

Foolishly Microsoft has made an error in judgement which I think they may regret. I can't run Linux on an arm based windows system and its become a major pain to install on an x86 system with secureboot.However Google is giving me options the chromebook is open to me to install Linux and do the stuff I want to do.

Maybe you should be looking to sell Chromebooks, perhaps even offer an alternative install. Mum and Dad won't care about the alternative but some of the kids might. I wouldn't be too surprised if steam makes it onto chrome os in the next year too, wouldn't that be ideal.

Pirating software so I can do on Windows what I can do for free on Linux is not an acceptable option. I think if i'm going to buy a laptop in the next 12 months it will be a chromebook. Don't give a monkeys about chromeOS same as for windows but I will have a nice bit of hardware to do with as I please and no microsoft tax.

My mom's laptop failed, so I convinced her to get the Samsung Chromebook. So far, she says she really likes it. It's dead simple to use, as it pretty much only does what she needs--web browsing and email. There's no settings for her to mess up, updates are silent and automatic, and it's next to impossible to "break" the OS. I offered to set it up for her, but all I actually had to do was enter her Gmail password and the WiFi password. The only setting I changed was to enable Google Instant.

From my own observations of playing around for 10 minutes, the hardware itself leaves a (very) little bit to be desired. The trackpad feels a little rough (though I'm comparing it to a MacBook Air, so it's hardly a fair comparison), and there is a noticeable delay when switching tabs. Again, though, I'm comparing a $250 machine to a $1400 machine, so it's hard to complain. Software-wise, accessing the settings page is slightly unintuitive (from the "desktop", click your username; it's not in the app list). Also, there's no caps lock, which may or may not be annoying. It's been replaced by a search button which doubles as the Windows key on a PC keyboard.

I'd like to think Microsoft are deliberately making a second rate Android version, but I have to admit it's probably just incompetence.

To list the major faults Skype for Android has:1. Video is upside down, if you rotate the device, then both the camera and video playback are upside down, but the other person does see you right way up in that case.2. Video is landscape only & very fuzzy, but the camera video is not fuzzy, probably the compression?3. Audio plays back very very quietly even with full volu

Yeah, it's been downloaded over 100 million times and has a 4 star rating on the Play store, so clearly not everyone is running into all 6 of the OP's problems. Maybe he was using an older version - I heard it had some bugs on certain devices earlier.

Somebody mod this up, please! Google Hangouts has been so very much more stable than Skype ever was when video chatting with our son off at college. Skype would die 2-3 times during a normal conversation, and we'd have to reconnect. Google Hangouts is rock solid so far, and leverages account credentials we already use heavily. No need to maintain a second username and password for the Skype ecosystem.

I don't feel this is that balanced, partly due to my experiences with Google hangouts (admittedly Skype is currently my preferred platform here, but to say Google hangouts is solid is not the case in my experience).

Somebody mod this up, please! Google Hangouts has been so very much more stable than Skype ever was when video chatting with our son off at college.

I have had instances when Skype was the only way to communicate with people over fairly restrictive networks. I will reflect on stability in my follo

"A new extra for Hangouts with extras: make phone calls from inside a hangout

We are constantly listening to feedback so that we can make Hangouts even better for Google+ users, and we're excited by the really cool ways people are using the product. Today we’re making it possible to make phone calls from inside a hangout, so you can dial people into the room from wherever they’re at. (Helpful for party lines and conference calls alike.)

This new feature is initially available inside Hangouts with extras (plus.google.com/hangouts/extras), and we currently support calls to the US and Canada (for free, in fact). The steps for adding a telephone participant are straightforward:

1. Click Invite at the top of the hangouts with extras window2. Click the Phone tab on the left of the window, and enter the phone number you wish to call.3. Click Call now.

We have higher speeds, more reliable and cheaper Internet (accessible to the majority of the population), mobile phone networks where unlimited really means... Unlimited and various laws to protect the consumer. I am okay not having Google Hangouts as an option, I think I got better the deal regardless. u mad?

There are a couple of apps, such as "imo messenger" that claim they will connect you to a skype call from within Chrome. I haven't tried them, but they get decent reviews. There's some instructions here on how to get a skype call going from a chromebook with imo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ArOPKoxE4Y [youtube.com]

That seems really limited compared to the regular Skype client. I'm not really convinced that buying a Chromebook would be better than buying a netbook because I'd lose out on so much Skype functionality and there is nothing really stopping imo.im from going away like Meebo.

it'll take you a month to learn to touch type. Do it with QWERTY first, just because that's what everything uses. After a year, come back and spend a month learning to touch-type Dvorak. I do 72wpm on QWERTY and 125 on Dvorak.

I asked the guys at BestBuy that I bought mine from. They said they weren't getting returns. When I bought mine, they were pretty aggressive in making sure I knew that it was a web-based system, and not Windows or Mac.

This means that it is possible to install Ubuntu (and several other Linux distributions) not that it is sold with Ubuntu already installed. For most buyers, the experience out of the box is what counts. Fwiiw, I think this will be perfectly acceptable for most bearing in mind the price tag.

This means that it is possible to install Ubuntu (and several other Linux distributions) not that it is sold with Ubuntu already installed. For most buyers, the experience out of the box is what counts. Fwiiw, I think this will be perfectly acceptable for most bearing in mind the price tag.

People running Linux know the difference between hardware and software, so this is a big plus for anyone who wants a linux laptop at what really is a great price for the hardware. Under $400 for a decent machine is really value for money.

So, certainly, laptops come in so many different flavors that the OSs that circulate in "one size fits all" SKUs will float to the top. We'd expect Macs and Chromebooks to sell more of a given configuration than a Microsoft box. But two months after the launch of Win 8, to see Win 7 beating it in the retail channel, that's news.

It's due to New-Old-Stock, i.e. laptops made last year when Win 7 was the only option and now being sold off cheaply. Most people don't chose Win7/Win8, they just buy whatever laptop suits their wallet.

a few models vs thousands of models and the story submitter is surprised that it can be the number 1 selling model? The only thing I am surprised at is that it beat out the also limited model ranges of Mac's.

I have been using the new ARM Chromebook with ChrUbuntu Alpha + refinemeents for almost 2 weeks and I have to say that it already a usable configuration.
Most of the important desktop stuff already works (suspend-resume, playing videos...etc) and with good speed.
This new Exynos 5250 is really a desktop class processor (at least as strong as the one in my old Toshiba Portege m200). For example: it cold-starts LibreOffice Writer in 5s which is pretty unheard of in the ARM world.
If I manage to setup hw accelerated video playing and Oracle's Java, I will be an extremely happy Chromebook owner but I already consider it a good purchase in its current state.

Yeah, it's shocking how fast this Exynos processor is, and the Chromebook handles graphics processes with ease. I can run more videos concurrently on it than on my desktop. My daughter hooks up the HDMI port to run her big flat screen TV with it and watch Hulu. I guess Netflix isn't working yet on the $250 model, but they are supposed to fix that soon. Also nice that you get a full-sized USB 3.0 port, a full-sized USB 2.0 port, and a full-sized HDMI port. Nicer than the MacBook Air in that regard - no need to run out and buy the MacBook-to-HDMI conversion adaptor for $30.

Just like Android, this OS will bring $100 Chinese laptops, that would be great for Linux users, and also provide great OLPC solution as a side effect. Only feature I need in future ChromeOS editions, is integrated VirtualBox, so that I can launch Ubuntu from within ChromeOS.

Chrome Remote Desktop works so well on the Chromebook, I haven't felt the need for a VM running on it - I just call up my desktop. But I'm doing that less and less, as the apps work really well, and the most important apps are almost all available offline now. In fact, I find the spreadsheet program to be more nimble and have some features that are missing in Excel, and I've been using it more than Excel recently.

It's cheap and do what most people want a laptop to do - check emails, surf the web and type up the occasional letter. It's also a good machine for geeks, since it's not locked down with Windows or OSX - meaning you can stick any flavour of Linux you want on it if you know how. In the current economic situation it taps into the same markets as the original netbooks - the 7" and 9" Eee - did; people needing a cheap machine to get online and geek-heads wanting a toy.

The danger is off course that the Chromebook will go down the same slippery slope as the netbooks fif; bigger screens, more beefed up hardware... until they are just another laptop.

Thing is, Apple firmware is based on UEFI 1.x, while on the PC side everything that's not BIOS is UEFI 2.0, which is different enough to cause problems. On top of that a lot of older Apple firmware is 32-bit and can't directly boot a 64-bit Windows even though the processor could handle it.

Not quite the same markets as the original netbooks, there is a difference and that is android and ios.non computer geeks had the mind set that they needed a windows pc like they had at work otherwise it wouldn't be compatible. The alternative was either a Mac or some obscure Linux machine.

The netbooks that were released with Linux either had the obscure xandros or the even more obscure linpus. Which were even disliked by people who liked to run linux.

The modern day computer buyer is not so naive as in 2007/2008 they have been using Android or IOS or both have been able to choose from 1000's of apps and games and there is a huge number that run in the browser.

Windows is an unpleasant experience from new, the trial ware, antivirus warnings and hard sell that come with a new windows system are confusing and frightening people. Nobody wants to deal with this junk. Even the create a back up disc is scary, you get one chance to make this disk if you mess up you are without a paddle, when was the last time you were asked to set up a windows device, pretty recently if you are the go to guy when it comes to computers.

Microsofts strategy is still obviously "you need windows" which is why they push the "windows experience" on every device and is also why they are failing, Chances are most people have a windows laptop in the house, (people do not want a work station at home,it is their home) In the vague circumstances that they need windows it is there and these days gathering dust.

There is next to zero configuration to do on an android or ios device usually its just a question of typing in the password written on the back of the router, and with android your google name and password. you do that and your pretty much set. Chromebook is pretty much more of the same.

Google has pretty much changed the landscape, about one of the few things people want to do that is slightly complicated is edit photo's and google gave us picassa. they gave us google docs and a place to keep the letters and spreadsheets and pdf files and its all there for us anywhere on our google accounts. I'm fairly sure apple does the same for ios and osx users.

Everything is simpler to do now. If i want to watch a movie that is on my tablet i can plug 1 hdmi cable from my TV / home cinema and hit play. it is that easy. With things like dlna i can have any media on my tablet or phone and playing on my tv. Did you never listen to the people who were saying how do i watch this on my tv not on my laptop.

So no it's not just a replacement for the netbook of a few years ago times have changed, people have changed and Microsoft are losing out. You know Google has been very clever in that they haven't locked down the chromebooks they have included developer mode, even look at the name doesn't it stroke your ego to be called a developer, not a neck beard or a computer geek. So there is Linux for those of us who want a little more and the best stuff that gets created will probably end up in android or chromebook or ios.

Repositories are a great idea, App stores are even better, play store is better than that, it's not work its play!To be fair look at the Repositories which are full of version numbers, no reviews a screenshot if your lucky no user feedback no developer feedback for the users. No alternatives and other programs you might like to try.

The playstore doesn't make a big deal about installing an App in fact they say carry on shopping while we download and install this and no stupid questions like do you want to install this here? or maybe not install this option? Shopping who doesn't like shopping and when most of the goods on sale are at the low price point of free, well maybe free with some ads (because nothings really free, is it). The ads probably don't sell a thing except the pro version of the software you are using.

Microsoft is as boring as it gets, don't you remember when everything was beige and to get hip everything became black and blue led strips

Does the basics (but don't look for serious application software for it soon, if ever), is as cheap as an old netbook was, and by being largely cloud-based, is probably "safer" in a lot of ways - not just malware, but the potential for corporations or institutions to remotely configure, update and "manage" (control) what their users can access.

What qualifies as major? I know i've seen ads for it a number of times. Admittedly i can't remember now if they were on TV or YouTube. Obviously putting self-promoting ads on YouTube is pretty easy for Google, but it's not like a lot of people wouldn't see them there.

Yes I know, Chipzilla is doing just fine, thankyaverymuch. But think about it: about 10 years ago we thought AMD would be the big challenger that would compete with Intel and reduce the Wintel monopoly. But AMD only did that semi-effectively. Yes it helped control costs (God help us to think what we'd be paying for computers these days if Intel were allowed to set its prices in a world without competition). But Android on ARM, some netbooks not long ago, and now Chromebooks seem to be the ones challenging the dominant computing paradigm. That means ARM has actually been the chip(s) that is currently causing the folks at Intel to sweat a little bit. Interesting times we live in.

AMD did one very important thing though. It made people realize that Intel is not a given, there are alternatives. Before K5 and K6 processors, the only choice people thought existed was choosing between P-I and P-II.

AMD is turning into the chip for Linux this round. Bulldozer has a big, mixed TLB for any size page; while Linux allows you to set automatic defragmentation and consolidation of RAM to make transparent huge pages. This means instead of reading a bunch of TLB entries for 4KiB pages and yanking 32MB of RAiM just to read 1GiB of RAM and having a 64 entry TLB that has to constantly rotate out cache because you're all over the place, Linux will automatically take 2MiB or 4MiB (or on some platforms a very wide

- There have also been plenty of prime-time ads for Chromebooks on TV - at least in the UK, and I imagine elsewhere.

- IME, most people don't really like Windows, they see it as a necessary evil. The advent of smartphones and tablets has very efficiently demonstrated that it's no longer necessary.

- Why don't people like Windows? There's a number of reasons, but most of them relate to incomprehensible and/or nonsensical error messages, a death-by-a-thousand-cuts of other expenses you pretty much have to incur like antivirus software, cheap hardware that's so damn nasty it doesn't look very cheap once you start trying to use it and dealing with the fallout when despite all of that you still click on the wrong thing and need to get someone in to fix it. (Yes, I know Android, iOS and ChromeOS are all hypothetically susceptible to similar issues. But the important point is they're not being actively exploited today).

- What is the recommended fix for these issues? Go out and buy the next version of Windows! (Which many people automatically assume means "buy a new PC", even if that's not true. You'd be surprised how many people honestly have no idea that you can replace Windows with a different version or even with something else entirely).

- Google has carved out an extremely strong brand. People see the word Google and associate it with finding what they want quickly and easily with a minimal amount of bullshit getting in the way. Associate Google with a laptop that doesn't do any of the things people dislike about Windows and you have a very interesting product indeed.

Maybe by then desktop will lose its meaning or be irrelevant, but many signals are pointing in the direction that in a not so far future will finally reach the year of Linux in the desktop. Is already the main OS for servers, supercomputers, mobile, computing devices [zdnet.com] in general (those last 2 mainly because Android), and not sure about embedded. And Chromebooks, Steam and Windows 8, among other factors, will be giving it a nice push this year.

The next debate probably will be that what is in the desktop (over the linux kernel) won't be a "traditional" linux desktop, KDE/Gnome and others will still be around, but the mainly used user interface/programs could be something not so native like android or html5 apps, but being Linux probably will be options to use what you prefer.

An apple like laptop for $300 bucks seems to be a bit of a no brainer. Like many slashdotters I am the technical adviser for most of my large family as well as work. With the exception of those who need specific Microsoft Programs or iTunes a Linux desktop on a machine with those specs would nicely meet the budget and needs of at least half my family. For my self I would love it as a second laptop. There are so many specs in the typical computer that far exceed the typical user's needs. My sister for example just bought an asus machine that I suggested as staples had a pretty good deal and her 7 year desktop really needed replacement. She is one of the people who must run a Windows machine so the specs are more demanding yet her 2TB HD is extreme overkill as she might need 20GB between the OS, MS Office and whatnot. I am willing to bet that in 2018 when she replaces this machine that the vast majority of her machine will be empty. Thus the tiny storage capacity of a Chromebook should be little detriment to most. But the better construction and lighter weight are far more important features that make the chromebook comparable to staples machines priced closer to $1000 as most of the sub $1000 stapes machines are clunky with cheap features such the split left shift key and load of bloatware. The same with many of the other lesser features of the chromebook as compared to "better" machines; most of the features where the chromebook is lesser are unimportant. The fact that at a glance the thing looks like a macbook won't hurt sales at all. So for anyone to be surprised that the chromebook is kicking ass is a surprise to me.

I am willing to bet that the MBA-types at places like HP are scratching their heads saying HP entry models are better than that damn thing as they go through a check list of how their machines are so much better feature for feature not realizing that 98% of customers don't even know what RAM does but their customers do know what they like when they see a friend with one and see that it runs a HD youtube video just as smoothly as the HP machine that has way more "L2 Cache".

The other thing that the MBA types are not realizing is that they are no longer competing with the laptop next to theirs in the display section of Staples or Best Buy but they are competing with the cell phone in the person's pocket.

I was under the impression it was heavily advertised. I don't remember what show my spouse was watching a few nights ago, but a Chromebook ad was part of every ad break. Given how little we watch stuff, from my experience the Chromebook is heavily advertised.

that is some twisted perspective considering 6 of the top 10 are windows lol.

I think he meant that this would be news if there were more Chrome-books on that list than Apple Macs since Apple is a smaller competitor to beat when it comes to laptop sales than the 800 pound gorilla that is Windows Laptops. Chrome-books displacing Windows laptops on the top 10 most sold list would be the next hurdle. Personally, I'll be impressed one of these Chrome-books managed to stays on that list on for any length of time, not that I'm especially impressed by that list, the one for music players st

that is some twisted perspective considering 6 of the top 10 are windows lol.

I think he meant that this would be news if there were more Chrome-books on that list than Apple Macs since Apple is a smaller competitor to beat when it comes to laptop sales than the 800 pound gorilla that is Windows Laptops.

Interesting way of putting it - 800 pound Gorilla. The fact is that even if those Windows laptops are 800 pound Gorillas, the macbooks are probably 1200 GBP gorillas.